


Anam Cara

by MissEllaVation



Category: U2 (Band)
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-04
Updated: 2019-02-04
Packaged: 2019-10-22 09:50:26
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,765
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17660498
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MissEllaVation/pseuds/MissEllaVation
Summary: One night in the south of France, 2007. And the memory of an earlier summer.





	Anam Cara

**Author's Note:**

> Firstly, I’m SO sorry I keep writing about heavy subjects—I’m starting to feel like matters of life and death are my fic specialty. :/
> 
> What happened was, I was feeling stuck and I asked likeamadonna for a prompt. She pointed out that no one writes much about the Vertigo or 360 eras, so I said “I can do that!” The only problem is, when you write about real people of a certain age, you can run into upsetting stuff. 
> 
> I didn’t feel like writing about the studio or the road again, so I chose a sort of U2-ish liminal space. It’s late May, 2007. U23D has just been screened in Cannes, though not yet released officially. It’s the aftermath of the Vertigo tour, during which Edge’s little daughter, Sian, became ill. I believe she was okay by this point, but of course it would be several years until she was officially out of the woods. Now, of course, she is one of the beautiful faces of “Songs of Experience.” 
> 
> Anyway, since they’re already in the South of France, Bono talks Edge into taking a short break at the B/E Compound. Maybe for just one night. This is totally made up nonsense and I’m sorry about it. 
> 
> Also, I had this nice Irish phrase, "anam cara," for a title. [Here is some stuff about that](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anam_Cara). 
> 
> Basically, this is a plotless mish-mash of emotion and sappy-romantical naughty sections that were obviously written by a girl.

Here, it already feels like summer. The afternoon sun shines lemon-yellow on the villa walls, and cool, leafy shadows move in the courtyard. The breeze smells of herbs growing wild, of the heavy flowers on the fruit trees. In an hour or so the whole neighborhood will smell of sauteed garlic and warm bread. Just beyond the end of the garden, the sea is breathing in and out, and the seabirds scream and dive for oysters.

Here is the place where we can finally mend ourselves, where we can mold ourselves like jelly into soft chairs in the sunlight. The work is done, the film is screened, and the bills are paid. (Probably.) The children are all at home, safely gathered in.

This last bit, while true on the whole, is the cause of the little crease between your eyebrows, the little twinge of primal fear that won’t let you go.

“I really should have gone straight home.”

Your voice lands like a blow to my throat. This _is_ home. Mine, with you. I really did think you wanted to be here today. It hurts sometimes that as close as we are, I can’t quite break through my own skin into yours, to feel what you feel. I want to find the tiny ice crystal of doubt lodged in the most private room of your heart, and melt it between my fingers. But all I can do is take your hand in mine, and try to warm it against my chest.

“I’m sorry, Edge. I’ve just missed you. I thought maybe you could use a quick break.”

“It doesn’t feel right, though. I mean, I know the worst is over, I really do know that. But it doesn’t _feel_ over.”

“Of course it doesn’t. That will take time.”

“I suppose so.”

“You’re a hero.”

“No. _She_ is.”

“Love, so are you. The tour was so long, really endless. And then we were being filmed for all those shows, and then… and then you had to keep flying back and forth. And you never missed a trick.”

You don’t say anything. You just pick up your drink with your free hand and take a very small sip, as if by denying yourself pleasure you can put the world back in balance. Oh Edge, I should have known better. You were acting so happy in Cannes that I just assumed you were your old self again. But how could you be? You will never be quite your old self again.

On the other hand, you did come here with me, so some part of you must have wanted to. Hopefully more than one part. (God, I’m incorrigible. Forgive me.)

“I missed you, The Edge. I missed _us_.”

“It _has_ been a while.” You turn to me with a little smile, and a few new lines around your eyes that are, of course, gorgeous. “But you’ve been a rock this whole time. For me. And for all of us.”

“That’s just what I want to be. Your rock. Your warm, plump little rock.”

“You’re not _plump_.”

“I know, I know. I’m a tall, slender Adonis.”

“Well. Let’s not get delusional.”

Much to my relief, you accept a punch on the arm with your usual grace.

We go for a walk on the beach before dinner, arm-in-arm because we’re in France, and no one in France bats an eye at physical affection between men. How could we not love this place? We’ve been living here part-time for thirteen years, during which the world has changed in unimaginable ways, but has also stayed the same. The sea is the same. The angle, the color, the heat of the setting sun are just the same. But sometimes I wish that first summer had never ended.

*

You and I had been the very thing we are, or were, for a few years by then. Some of our friends knew; others didn’t. We had several good reasons to be secretive, and of course something that’s a secret stays exciting much longer than something that’s out in the open.

I wanted you so much then. Every minute of every day. I sometimes watched you from behind my sunglasses, even while I was talking to someone else. I became quite adept at doing two things at once.

I liked to watch you run into the surf with a happy, shrieking kid under each arm, the sun burnishing your wet skin. I liked to watch you stand on the deck with a drink in your hand, shifting your weight from one slim, naked foot to the other, every line of your body elegant and taut. I liked the way you leaned forward into a conversation while the hem of your swim trunks dripped seawater down the backs of your legs. If I wanted to I could have crept up behind you, put my hand on your cock, my lips on your ear. I knew just how you would respond. How you would press against my hand and whisper my name.

Of course I didn’t do that. (Not in public.) I did flirt relentlessly with everyone else, including old women and babies, because I could never stop myself. But that was mostly a distraction. I didn’t want to hover around you too much. I didn’t want to be a burden to you.

We had our private signals. Our times and places. We were as hedonistic as it was possible to be with so many wives, girlfriends, and children around us.

I’m thinking of one night in particular, an endless impromptu party that began at the Morea and ended with a bonfire and music on the beach. We were all so young, although we didn’t realize we were. But so much beautiful young flesh. Ali and Morleigh laughing with the Big Girls, their hair and their light summer dresses fluttering in the breeze. And the friends we’d brought down from Dublin, and the friends we’d picked up along the way. I had drunk and danced myself into a state of ecstasy. There might have been some chemical Ecstasy in the mix as well. I wanted to fuck everyone and everything. I decided I was a shaman, as I danced in a circle round the fire, privy to the secrets of the earth and the universe. I thought I could feel my heart beating in perfect synch with the tide.

Well, these revels can’t go on forever. People get tired. Most people do, anyway. A certain amount of attrition began at three a.m. and continued for the next hour or so. Lights went on in the houses, then went off. As dawn broke, no one was left on the beach but me. And you.

You took great care to douse the fire and smother any possible hot spots with sand. I watched the sky. The weather was turning.

“Edge, what’s that old rhyme about the red skies at morning?”

“Red skies at night, sailor’s delight. Red skies at morning, sailors take warning.”

“I knew you’d know.”

The sky to the east was distinctly ominous and unsettled. The wind rose and scoured the beach. The sea was rough—the color of a plum, or a bruise. I wasn’t drunk anymore. I can’t say why I did what I did next. But I could hear the concern and the weariness in your voice.

“Bono, that’s not a great idea right now. Where are you going?”

The water was up to my thighs.

“Bono?”

The water was up to my waist, and deceptively warm as the Mediterranean can be in summer. And definitely a bit rough.

I looked back over my shoulder. “You want me, Edge?”

You waded in up to your knees, and stood there rocking on the balls of your feet. I couldn’t quite make out your expression, but I was pretty sure it was shifting between desire and murder.

“Edge?”

“Yes.”

“Yes what?”

“Yes, I want you.”

“How far would you go to get me?” I felt the waves buffeting my back, my feet sinking into the sandy bottom. “This far?”

You walked forward, arms raised, legs fighting with the current.

I took a step backward. “This far?” I could feel the unease of the water, the tidal change. The first cold finger of the rip current that pulls unsuspecting swimmers to their deaths.

You walked forward.

We were chest-deep now, the waves slapping and pushing at us. We weren’t touching but the water conducted the heat of your body towards mine. You shifted around to plant your feet more firmly on the bottom; you folded your arms across your chest.

The wind roared in in my ears. “One more step, Edge.”

“No. Playtime is over. You come here now.”

It seemed that was all I needed. To be told what to do. Someone to take control so I wouldn’t let the sea carry me all the way to Tunisia.

I lunged forward and you took me in your arms. I clung to your neck, wrapped my legs around your waist, and let the water carry my weight as you pulled us backward toward shore, murmuring “sweetheart, angel” in my ear. In the shallower water, you dropped to your knees. I bobbed with the current, still holding you with my legs. You bit at my neck and my hair. We shoved aside the thin fabric of our swimsuits. Anyone watching from shore would only see our heads and torsos as we moved and moved together. I supposed.

“I wanted you all day, Edge.”

“You wanted everyone.” Your hands slipped down my sides, to my waist, to my ass.

“I didn’t, Edge.”

“No?”

“I really didn’t. I don’t.”

“Who do you want, sweetheart?”

“You, Edge.” I kissed your ears, your beautiful slim neck, your salty shoulders. “Only you. So much that it hurts.”

You held me, moved me against yourself as if I were a piece of silk and not a solid, fleshy man. Bless the water for making us so light. I arched my back till I felt my hair floating, and looked up at the gathering clouds. Your fingers traced a path up my chest, the length of my neck, then gripped my jaw. “God, just look at you. My siren.”

You had never called me that before. (You’ve never called me that since, but I’ll never forget.) I was overcome. The hardness of you on my belly. Your hands on me, hot and cold at once. I held your forearms to pull myself up toward you again, and managed to spare a thought for your poor knees before losing myself against you in a red swirl of pleasure and release. Too soon, but I had been holding back for days. You said my name in a way that was close to sobbing, your face on my neck, your hands kneading me, moving me. Your warm come, and mine, floating there between us, then carried away by the tide.

We half-crawled, half-staggered up to the beach and collapsed, and lay there gasping and laughing. In our absence, someone had driven through in a dune buggy, leaving wide tire marks in the sand, and a row of red flags planted at intervals along the shore. There would be no more swimming today.

We stayed there until we began to shiver. You pulled me close one last time and petted my sodden hair. “My baby, my baby. You need to stop doing so much stupid shit, okay?”

“Okay. I’ll try.”

“You’ll try?”

“Not to do so much stupid shit.”

I loved you so much, Edge. I knew it that night—that this bond between us was permanent, as important and unshakable as any marriage. You followed me into danger and carried me back. I would carry you through anything, though I doubted I would ever have to.

*

The truth is that I would love a night just like that one, right now. You and me, reckless and fearless in the elements. But we have become sensible men—even me, most of the time—and so we turn away from the darkening horizon, and carry our shoes back toward the house, toward a dinner that someone else has prepared, and an egregiously comfortable bed.

And it’s so good just to lie here with you, with the windows open to the sea breeze, both of us drowsy and warm from a rich meal and a bottle of sauvignon blanc. I’m almost asleep when your voice cuts through the darkness.

“It’s the one thing that’s made me question my faith.”

You might have been talking for a few minutes while I dozed, but I don’t even have to ask what you mean. I’ve met people who watched their children starve to death. It draws a black veil over the sun forever. If I thought you were feeling even an ounce of that dread, I would drain every drop of my own blood, I would sacrifice my life for hers. Because _your_ child, I feel, is also my child. Our child. In a certain way. In spirit. But you might not agree to this, so I just keep my mouth shut and hold you, and rub circles around your bare chest in a way I hope is soothing while I wait for you to say more.

“So I appreciated _your_ faith even more through this whole…all of it. I felt like you were covering for me while I couldn’t be there, and maybe that would make it okay.”

“Ah Edge. If that were possible, you know I’d be honored to do it. Maybe it is, and maybe I did! But I know that if I had a direct line to God, I’d make everything alright.”

“I think you _do_ have a direct line. Anyway, everything is alright now. It is. Which is so amazing. Just—”

“It’s okay to have doubts, you know. It doesn’t hurt anyone. It’s okay to be afraid, too.”

You lift my hand from your chest so we can interlace our fingers. We watch our clasped hands floating in the dark above us. “Sweetheart. My best friend.”

“My _anam cara_ , my soul-friend.”

“You know that _anam cara_ isn’t supposed to be used in the romantic sense, right?”

“I’m not being romantic, Edge. I’m being realistic.”

You shift onto your side and smile, and I feel your mood change, suddenly, like the lighting of a lamp. “So, what do you want tonight?”

“Hm. What have you got?”

“I think I’d like you to take charge this time.”

“Oh yeah?”

“Yeah. Think you can handle me?”

“Not sure. You’re a tough nut to crack.”

Of course we must spend the next five minutes laughing like twelve-year-olds at ‘nut’ and ‘crack,’ but you settle down a bit when I push you onto your back and hold you there.

I love the way you look up at me, the way you study my face with your eyes and your fingers, as if I’m a beautiful object from an archaeological dig whose meaning and function are obscure. No one else looks at me this way—with the exception of front-row fans, but of course they don’t actually have to live with me.

“Are you going to keep your hair short like this, B?”

“For now. Do you like it?”

“I do.” You run your hand over my scalp, around my ears and down the back of my neck, making me shiver. “You look powerful.”

“And you…look like you could use a good fuck.”

Ah. It’s so gratifying to hear you laugh, to feel you writhing a little underneath me. It is my great pleasure to kiss and kiss and kiss you, and to shift some pillows around, and to go rooting through the bedside table in a most unromantic way, because this is our less common arrangement, and I want you to love it as much as I do.

*

“This is all right?”

“Yes.”

A little deeper. “And this?”

“God Bono, yes.”

A little more. “You’re so warm. You’re so beautiful, Edge. Do I tell you that enough? Look at you—Mr. Symmetry. No bad angles, inside or out.”

“Babe…is there no situation in which you will not keep talking?”

“Not really. Here, shift your leg a little. Let me hold you. That’s it. Oh Edge. You’re really beautiful. Your flesh is like silk. You feel like…” There isn’t actually a word. Not a good enough word. Not for you. Only skin, heat, breath, and your hands on me, making subtle adjustments, holding me back, and oh, bringing me in. There are no words good enough to describe your flushed eyelids, your parted lips, the bead of sweat in the hollow of your throat.

“Fuck me, Bono.”

The most beautiful phrase in the English language. “Yes, love. I will fuck you for a thousand years if you want. Just say it again.”

“Fuck me.”

“I could stay here. I mean, I could live here if you want me to. Inside you. It’s better here. I’d be a better person.”

“I hope it’s this good for you when I—”

“It is, Edge. You know it is.”

“I’m sorry I don’t see you from this perspective more often.” You say this between quickening breaths. “Gorgeous man.”

“I’m fine with any perspective, Edge.”

This is a pretty good one though. I study it for a while. We both do. The way your legs fit my shoulders. I see your eyes roving down my neck, down my chest, down to where our bodies are joined. I look too. Me inside you. You, beautifully hard and straining toward the slightest friction. And this, I think, is why men are blessed with upper-body strength—not to move furniture around, but to touch their partners without losing their balance. “You angel. I want you to come.”

As if you needed a cue, you dutiful boy. Your voice—your voice is the secret strength of our entire operation. The most beautiful sound I’ve ever heard. And your face—

“I love you so much, Edge. So much.”

You’ve gone somewhere beyond words, but the brief smile that flickers across your face is all I need. All I need. To join you there. In the light.

*

I wake up far too early, out of vivid dreams full of signs and portents. There’s one in particular I want to share with you, but it can wait. You like to sleep late, and I still feel a little guilty about talking you into coming here when you felt you should be at home.

So I shower and dress, and walk out into the village to get coffee and brioche to bring home to you—a little offering. I can do this here, just walk out into an early weekday morning and buy things as if I were anyone at all. The locals recognize me, but their tolerance and their discretion know no bounds. I suppose it helps that we’re here slightly “pre-season.” We are _sans_ entourage, and I guess no one tipped off the paparazzi. I feel I can breathe.

On my walk back, I try to recall my dream in detail so I can share it with you. It was a happy, bright dream—a rarity. I was in the villa, looking out the bedroom window, down onto the big patio where we eat, drink, and make merry every summer. A beautiful young woman stood there, looking up at me. She had your face, Edge, and a fountain of thick, black hair. A tee-shirt and shorts, and the sunlight on her limbs. Sand on her feet. She was holding a basketball for some reason. I said, ‘hello, who are you?’ And she rolled her eyes as if I were an idiot and said, ‘it’s _me_ , Bono. Me in the future.’

I don’t know if you can feel all your hair stand on end while you’re sleeping, but if you can, I certainly did. I wanted to keep her there, so I asked her what the future was like. And she said, ‘it’s better.’ That’s all. I woke up feeling ecstatic, but inevitably, the dream and the feeling faded a little in the daylight.

When I return, you’re sitting at the dining room table with your laptop—fully dressed, rosy-cheeked, and smelling expensively clean. You look up with a smile. “I’m flying home late-afternoon. I’ll have a car take me to the airport. So you don’t have to worry about anything.”

“Well. I suppose I’ll go back to Dublin. Or I might hang around here for another day. Why not?” Freedom really does feel like too many choices. I set our coffee and treats out on the table and sit beside you.

You give me a bit of side-eye. "What is it?"

"Brioche."

"No. What is it you want to tell me?"

“You're terrifying, you know that?”

“Please. After all these years? Just tell me.”

“It’s a bit silly.”

“I’m sure. Tell me anyway.”

“Drink your coffee.”

“Bono.”

I realize I’m leaning too far forward. I can feel tension gathering as a twinge in my lower back. I think I won’t tell you about the dream after all. It might be a little cruel. After all, it’s only a dream, and who wants to hear about other people’s dreams, even in the best of circumstances? Any good writer will tell you: steer clear of dreams. And this dream, by rights, should have been yours. Not mine.

“Bono?”

“I was just gonna tell you that I had some interesting dreams this morning. That’s all.”

You roll your eyes, in much the same way your dream-daughter did. “And what were they about?”

“Oh, it all just seems silly now. Stuff about the future.”

But you know me too well. You know I’m keeping something from you, possibly for your own protection. You take my big stupid hand between your two slim, perfect ones, turn it over, and touch all my fingertips, one after the other, as if you’re counting beads.

“So. What’s the future like, Bono?”

I can answer this much, at least. “It’s better.”

You lean back in your chair and let out a long sigh, feigning exasperation. “Better, is it? That’s good. I’m glad to know that.” You're still holding my hand. “Anyway, thank you for a beautiful night, soul friend. And thank you for this beautiful day, too.”

"Ugh."

"Sorry."

“God, I’m beginning to hate that song.”

“But you like those royalty cheques, sweetheart.”

“Don’t we all, Edge?”

“Presumably they’ll still be a part of our better future?”

“Presumably they will, my love.”


End file.
